Florida State Hangs On Against Notre Dame, Gets Second ACC Win
It wasn't looking good there for a little bit in the first half. Notre Dame opened up an 11-point lead midway through the first half, but Florida State stayed locked in, fought back, and it ended up being a very back-and-forth game but FSU would hang on in the end. It was a hard-fought effort that pays off with a 2-1 ACC start, and Notre Dame staying winless in Tallahassee, and the home team continues to dominate this series.
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This was a very strange statistical game, as we'll get into in a second, but it was yet another FSU/Notre Dame game that came down to the wire with this being the second of the last three games in Tallahassee to finish as a 1-point margin. Matthew Cleveland was superb again, and Cameron Corhen was phenomenal with Naheem McLeod not playing in this one. Let's get into some stats.
I love the scoring balance from Florida State's starters. Three players had 18+ points, with Matthew Cleveland achieving a third straight double/double (first time since 1995 that's been done by an FSU player) with 19 points and 13 rebounds and 3 made threes, Caleb Mills with a smooth 18 points on 13 shots, and Cameron Corhen with a strong 18 points and 7 rebounds. Darin Green was cold in this game but still had 8 points, and Jalen Warley had his best game of the season (at least in my opinion) with 9 points and 5 assists. There was a massive difference anytime Warley wasn't on the floor and you could feel it.
This was the second straight game in which an FSU player set a career high in points, as Corhen's 18 was the most he's had in his young career. He was simply superb tonight. He missed a couple easy ones early, but he was consistently going through Notre Dame post defenders with strong finishes, and the most impressive part was he had just 1 foul in 31 minutes. For his style of play, that's extremely impressive given his youth. He's going to be really good and I can't wait to see how he continues to develop.
Notre Dame came into this game with the worst opposing free throw percentage in the country at 78%, something they have no control over. FSU shot 12/14 (86%) on free throws tonight to make that number rise even more. It's such a weird stat, but it's clearly having an effect on the outcome of their games. And I also said FSU had to keep Notre Dame from having double digit free throw attempts, and they had just 9. They did a great job of defending without fouling, which was clear when they only had 4 fouls in the second half.
For Notre Dame, JJ Starling had one of his best games of the season with 20 points on 7/11 shooting, and was single-handedly keeping the Irish in the game down the stretch. He was hitting logo threes, tough finishes in transition, and had the last 6 points of the game down the stretch to get them back in the game and give them a fighting chance.
Nate Laszewski dealt with foul trouble but still finished with 12 points, Cormac Ryan had 17 points, and Dane Goodwin had just 2 points in this game, which is a big reason FSU won this game, as he didn't score until there were about 7 minutes left in the game.
FSU has some time off before hitting the road to play Duke on New Year's Eve. It should be a motivated Blue Devils team who is coming off of a double-digit loss.
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